all of them. This is one, right by this ice machine.”
“Okay . . .”
“Who did your chip and put that mark on your face? Was it Tony?”
Luke’s eyes began to burn, and he didn’t quite trust himself to speak, whether it was safe or not. He just nodded.
“He’s one of the mean ones,” Maureen said. “Zeke is another. So is Gladys, even though she smiles a lot. There are plenty of people working here who like pushing kids around, but those are three of the worst.”
“Tony slapped me,” Luke whispered. “Hard.”
She ruffled his hair. It was the kind of thing ladies did to babies and little kids, but Luke didn’t mind. It was being touched with kindness, and right now that meant a lot. Right now that meant everything.
“Do what he says,” Maureen said. “Don’t argue with him, that’s my best advice. There’s people you can argue with here, you can even argue with Mrs. Sigsby, much good it will do you, but Tony and Zeke are two bad bumblebees. Gladys, too. They sting.”
She started down the corridor again, but Luke caught her by the sleeve of her brown uniform and tugged her back to the safe area. “I think Nicky hit Tony,” he whispered. “He had a cut and a mousy eye.”
Maureen smiled, showing teeth that looked long overdue for dental work. “Good for Nick,” she said. “Tony probably paid him back double, but still . . . good. Now come on. With you to help me, we can get these rooms ready in a jiff.”
The first one they visited had posters of Tommy Pickles and Zuko—Nickelodeon characters—on the walls, and a platoon of G.I. Joe action figures on the bureau. Luke recognized several of them right off the bat, having gone through his own G.I. Joe phase not all that long ago. The wallpaper featured happy clowns with balloons.
“Holy crap,” Luke said. “This is a little kid’s room.”
She gave Luke an amused glance, as if to say You’re not exactly Methuselah. “That’s right. His name is Avery Dixon, and ’cording to my sheet, he’s just ten. Let’s get to work. I bet I only have to show you how to do a hospital corner once. You look like a kid who catches on quick.”
10
Back in his room, Luke held one of his tokens up to the laptop’s camera. He felt a little stupid doing it, but the computer opened at once, first showing a blue screen with a message on it reading WELCOME BACK DONNA! Luke frowned, then smiled a little. At some point before his arrival, this computer had belonged (or been on loan, anyway) to someone named Donna. The welcome screen hadn’t been changed yet. Someone had slipped up. Just a tiny slip, but where there was one, there might be others.
The welcome message disappeared and a standard desktop photo appeared: a deserted beach under a dawn sky. The info strip at the bottom of the screen was like the one on his computer at home, with one glaring (but at this point unsurprising) difference: no little email postage stamp. There were, however, icons for two Internet providers. This surprised him, but it was a nice surprise. He opened Firefox and typed AOL log-in. The blue screen came back, this time with a pulsing red circle in the middle. A soft computer voice said, “I’m sorry, Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that.”
For a moment Luke thought it was another slip-up—first Donna, then Dave—before realizing it was the voice of HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Not a goof, just geek humor, and under the circumstances, as funny as a rubber crutch.
He googled Herbert Ellis and got HAL again. Luke considered, then googled the Orpheum Theatre on Hennepin, not because he was planning to see a show there (or anywhere in the immediate future, it seemed), but because he wanted to know what information he could access. There had to be at least some stuff, or else why give him the connection at all?
The Orf, as his parents called it, seemed to be one of the sites approved for “guests” of the Institute. He was informed that Hamilton was coming back (“By Popular Demand!”), and Patton Oswalt would be there next month (“Your Sides Will Split!”). He tried googling the Broderick School and got their website, no problem. He tried Mr. Greer, his guidance counselor, and got HAL. He was beginning to understand Dr. Dave Bowman’s frustration in the movie.